Tuesday, July 29, 2008

A quick rant for my mental health…

He’s doing better, but C-Money and this bitch are about to go off with a level of bitchitude that may reverse the flow of the Mississippi River for a few days.

Why must people tax our Afros?

Why?

This bitch would like to add some shit to the curriculum of whoever is teaching the social workers of tomorrow.

Cough.

#1 - Return phone calls…Particularly if the person calling is the guardian of a client who jumped out of a motherfucking van last week and who is calling you because your staff was so late to his follow-up doctor’s appointment that IT WAS FUCKING CANCELED!

And why were they so late?

Because they were out of gas.

Lawd, give me strength!

#2 – Remove the phrase “I understand why you are upset” from you vocabulary until you retire…Even if you did understand, a bitch doesn’t give a fuck.

This is my brother…he could have died last week…I don’t want to hear about you.

When y’all demonstrate that you are capable of getting my brother to a medical appointment on time...or finding your ass with both hands...we’ll move on to things like understanding what it feels like to have a 38 year old brother who will never explain to you why he jumped out of a moving van into traffic and damn near killed himself.

Blink.

#3 – Lose the vocabulary words…stat...If a bitch wanted to be an MSW, my black ass would be an MSW. So, cease tossing around terms and acting confused when I don’t refer to something by some super specific term.

Tylenol is fucking Tylenol and I won’t trust anyone over the age of ten who doesn’t know that shit to walk my dawgs much less supervise my brother’s care.

13 comments:

I soooo feel your pain. I cared for both my mom and my dad before they died, and dealing with health care providers is; to say the least, bullshit.

Add lower-level health care workers to the list of workers who need to be paid more; not paid more for their foolishness now, but to enable the hiring of more honest, hardworking people.

Not all CNA's are bad; in fact, the ones that cared for my aunt were fabulous. It's the ones who have worked their way through the system, and have developed a short-sightedness when it comes to patient care.

I readily admit that I don't know what it takes to become a CNA, but some of the ones I dealt with were (how do I say this delicately), dumb as a box of hammers, or just didn't care.

I have so many stories. For example, the CNA I hired to take care of my mom wasn't cleaning her private areas properly; she was so bad that my mom developed several infections because of it.

And, let's not talk about the stealing, check forgery, and I even caught one of my CNA's using my deceased mom's name to get HER own prescriptions filled.

Needless to say, my afro was taxed too. I have reported these women to the state and their certificates were pulled, but I'm sure one of them is still working.

The facilities that care for my loved ones weren't much better either. They stole my father's robes, slippers, walkman and cd's when he was in a prestigious nursing home ( $3500 a day)that his job's insurance paid for.

When asking about the care of my father, I was often talked over, ignored and blown off. It was only when I called the licensing board, and acted "urban' that I got some action.

So what do you do? You do what I should have done.

See if there is an advocacy organization that can intervene on your behalf in your area. These people an cut through red tape, circumvent the bullshit, and get back to you with some sort of definitive answer. Also, they can spot trouble within an institution and report it.

I'd only wished I found them in time to help me. I had to take a more active role in the care of my mom ( my dad had already passed), so I was basically alone. It took a heavy toll on me and my health.

Now Shark-Fu, I understand that you are upset. Your afro is about to explode, indicating that you may suffer from an Intermittant Rage Disorder. Or it could be cephalagia. Oh, what's that? A headache. Perhaps some acetemetaphin would help. Oh, what's that? Tylenol, and this fine company has five different brands. Ignore those rumors which suggest they're linked kidney failure. Please also understand that gas prices are so bad, that our underpaid staff cannot afford it. At least that's what they're telling us. They might be looking for new jobs. If you would like to apply, we'd be open, but you''ll have to promise not to swear at us or the clients. We will provide you with excellent training and a manual of How To Intimidate Clients So They'll Think You're Smarter Than Them & That They Don't Really Need Resources.

I'm messing with ya and hope it cheers you up. As one who has been both a social worker & therapist, but also needed agency and school resources for my handicapped child but had to fight tooth and nail for them, I know where you're coming from. It's a bitch.

I understand your frustration... somebody kill me please. They made us take "conflict resolution" at work. That was one of the skills. I explain to them that this clearly meant nothing. And what people really want is the goddamn MFing problem solved.

I haven't visited your blog in a while so I was not aware what had happened to your brother...

The last time I visited your blog, we were all celebrating this birthday...

This is crushing news and I am very sorry to hear about what you have had to go through...

I completely understand your frustration in dealing with the social workers and since I am a rape trauma responder I can tell you that we are TRAINED to give certain responses to people who are "venting".... so if the responses sound like they are from some 3-ring binder... chances are... they are straight from the training binder...

Bill is doing so much better. His face is healing and now to major concern is that we prevent him from peeling the scabs (he's a face picker on a good day. We're applying ointment to prevent infection and itching.

We are truly blessed and we know it. Even the doctors couldn't believe Bill managed to not break anything or worse.

And we are also blessed that we are here and can make the changes required to prevent this kind of accident again.

Shark-fu, I am an MSW, and I understand your frustration. Just kidding.

Actually, it frustrates the hell out of me how many MSWs and other service providers who, if they don't have the education certainly have the experience, continually fail to follow the first precept of care -- "first, do no harm". That, and apparently customer service skills like returning phone calls are not part of the social service industry.

One of the hardest things to teach is *real* empathy, not the "from the training binder" empathy that too often passes for it. Hope you find a worker with that quality, soonest.

I teach social work in a community college, and I use social workers like that as examples of the social worker they don't want to be.

I drill professionalism into them from day one: be on time, complete paperwork promptly, return calls. I start by requiring that behavior in my own classroom, no exceptions -- be present, be on time, be appropriate, and late assignments are not accepted.

In our skills class we learn to avoid the "I understand" message at all costs -- it's downright insulting, and chances are, you don't understand.

And they are not allowed to use jargon and acronyms at all. I use the first episode of an old show called judging amy -- when amy shows up for court as the new family court judge and the attorneys are throwing acronyms right and left and it sounds like a foreign language and amy turns to her assistant for interpretation -- as an example of why it's inappropriate.